sere

Etymology 1

From Middle English ser, sere, seare, seer, seere, seir, seyr (“dry, withered; emaciated, shrivelled; brittle; bare; dead, lifeless; barren, useless”), from Old English sēar, sīere (“dry, withered; barren; sere”), from Proto-West Germanic *sauʀ(ī), from Proto-Germanic *sauzaz (“dry, parched”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂sews-, *sh₂ews- (“to be dry”). Cognate with Dutch zoor (“dry and coarse”), Greek αὖος (aὖos, “dry”), Lithuanian sausas (“dry”), Middle Low German sôr (Low German soor (“arid, dry”)), Old Church Slavonic suχŭ (“dry”),. Doublet of sear and sare.

adj

1. (archaic or literary, poetic) Without moisture; dry.
   [T]he recitation of Border Minstrelsy, or a well-sung ballad, served to revive the sere and yellow leaf of age by their refreshing memories of the pleasurable past. 1868, Henry Lonsdale, “The Græmes, Grames, or Grahams of the Borders”, in The Worthies of Cumberland. The Right Honourable Sir J[ames] R[obert] G[eorge] Graham, Bart. of Netherby, London: George Routledge & Sons,[…], →OCLC, page 1
   Perhaps it is the scant, delicate detail revealing finer lines, which thus turns corners of Tuscany into an imaginary Hellas. Or perhaps the mere sunny austerity of these rocky sere places, the twitter of birds telling of renewed life, suggesting what, to us, seem the homes of the world's happy youth. 1905, Vernon Lee [pseudonym; Violet Paget], The Enchanted Woods and Other Essays on the Genius of Places, London, New York, N.Y.: John Lane, →OCLC, page 314
   […] a blighted land / More wasted, serer than before. 1979, Pintíg: Sa Malamig Na Bakal: Lifepulse in Cold Steel: Poems and Letters from Philippine Prisons, Hong Kong: Resource Centre for Philippine Concerns, →OCLC, page 28
   Except for their crawlers, and a crow flickering past in the mist, nothing moved: the grass was sere and golden, the dirt beneath white and gravelly. 1984, Vernor Vinge, “The Peace War”, in Stanley Schmidt, editor, Analog Science Fiction and Fact, volume 104, New York, N.Y.: Davis Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, chapter 37, page 47, column 2
2. (archaic or literary, poetic) Of thoughts, etc.: barren, fruitless.
   Our talk had been serious and sober, But our thoughts they were palsied and sere— Our memories were treacherous and sere 1847, Edgar Allan Poe, Ulalume: A Ballad
3. (obsolete) Of fabrics: threadbare, worn out.

Etymology 2

From Latin serere, present active infinitive of serō (“to entwine, interlace, link together; to join in a series, string together”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ser- (“to bind, tie together; to thread”).

noun

1. (ecology) A natural succession of animal or plant communities in an ecosystem, especially a series of communities succeeding one another from the time a habitat is unoccupied to the point when a climax community is achieved.
   We examined one of several seres found in the middle Rocky Mountains that progress from a subalpine or montane forb-dominated meadow to a climax forest dominated by Engelmann spruce (Picea engelmannii). 1980 August, Douglas C. Andersen, James A. MacMahon, Michael L. Wolfe, “Herbivorous Mammals along a Montane Sere: Community Structure and Energetics”, in Journal of Mammology, volume 61, number 3, Baltimore, Md.: American Society of Mammalogists, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2018-07-21, page 501
   [C]ommunity types may represent either climax plant associations or successional communities within a sere. 1988 December, Walter F. Mueggler, “Approach”, in Aspen Community Types of the Intermountain Region (General Technical Report; INT-250), Ogden, Ut.: Intermountain Research Station, Forest Service, United States Department of Agriculture, →OCLC, page 5, column 1
   [S]ome communities persisted as repeating early successional seres ("disclimaxes"), while climax communities could contain small areas of different sere communities. 2007, Thomas J. Stohlgren, “History and Background, Baggage and Direction”, in Measuring Plant Diversity: Lessons from the Field, Oxford: Oxford University Press, part I (The Past and Present), page 31

Etymology 3

From Old French serre (modern French serre (“talon”)), from serrer (“to grip tightly; to shut”) (modern French serrer (“to squeeze; to tighten”)), from Vulgar Latin serrāre (“to close, shut”), from Late Latin serāre, present active infinitive of serō (“to fasten with a bolt; to bar, bolt”), from sera (“bar for fastening doors”), from serō (“to bind or join together; entwine, interlace, interweave, plait”); see further at etymology 2.

noun

1. (obsolete) A claw, a talon.

Etymology 4

From Middle English ser, sere, schere, seer, seere, seir, seyr, seyre (“different; diverse, various; distinct, individual; parted, separated; many, several”), from Old Norse sér (“for oneself; separately”, dative reflexive pronoun, literally “to oneself”), from sik (“oneself, myself, yourself, herself, himself; ourselves, yourselves, themselves”), from Proto-Germanic *sek (“oneself”), from Proto-Indo-European *swé (“self”). The English word is cognate with Danish sær (“singular”), især (“especially, particularly”), German sich (“oneself; herself, himself, itself; themselves”), Icelandic sig (“oneself; herself, himself, itself; themselves”), Latin sē (“herself, himself, itself; themselves”), Scots seir, Swedish sär (“particularly”).

adj

1. (obsolete or Britain, dialectal) Individual, separate, set apart.
2. (obsolete or Britain, dialectal) Different; diverse.
   Thou wert well-nee moidered [footnote: Distracted.] wi' me, I know, but it thou'd telled me, Mary, I mun do better or else we mun goo our sere-ways [footnote: Different ways.], belike I should a done better. I'm nobbut a mon, Mary, a lundy day-tale mon [footnote: Clumsy day-labourer.]. 1910, James Prior, “Bishoped Porridge”, in Fortuna Chance, London: Constable & Co. Ltd., →OCLC, page 316